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The border between Afghanistan and Pakistan's northwest territories has a long and violent past. Through a collage of historical narrative and ethnographic research, Benjamin D. Hopkins and Magnus Marsden counter the stereotypes and simplistic assessments that obscure a more accurate picture of this frontier, at the same time exposing the web of difficulties now facing local and international actors.

This border region is anything but an isolated depot rife with radical terrorists and tribesmen. The frontier is rich with meaning, influenced by centuries of development by its inhabitants and their conceptions of those who operate outside their world. Fragments of the Afghan Frontier provides a deeper understanding of this evolving region, which grows more and more significant as the West steps up its counterterrorist campaigns.

Editorial Reviews

Review

If you think you know the Pakistan/Afghan frontier, think again. This innovative collaboration between an historian and an anthropologist has produced a remarkable and readable book that sheds new light on the dynamics of the region. It will be a standard text for a very long time to come.

Fragments of the Afghan Frontier is unique in many respects, particularly in the way it combines the disciplines and methodologies of history and anthro¬pology (archival and ethnographic) in fascinating and unexpected ways. While several recent books have taken the Afghan-Pakistan border as their subject, this one captures a broader historical range (1870 to the present) and a more diverse population than any other recent study. The book is theoretically sophisti¬cated in its understanding of the dynamics of border regions and shines a light on significant events whose historical importance and resonance for present cir¬cumstances have been inadequately appreciated, if not altogether ignored.

(David B. Edwards, Williams College)

The essays in this excellent volume will provide a jolt to those making easy generalizations -- too often used to guide policy -- that misjudge the sophistication and complexity of the societies of the Afghanistan-Pakistan frontier. The authors pair serious archival research with extensive ethnographic experience, making a remarkable contribution to a subject of unquestioned importance.

If you think you know the Pakistan/Afghan frontier, think again. This innovative collaboration between an historian and an anthropologist has produced a remarkable and readable book that sheds new light on the dynamics of the region. It will be a standard text for a very long time to come.

(Charles Lindholm, University Professor of Anthropology, University of Boston, and author of Generosity and Jealousy: The Swat Pukhtun of Northern Pakistan.)

A useful corrective to anyone who thinks their views are based on reason rather than simple prejudice.

(Myra MacDonald Reuters)

Review

Much of the attention of the world has turned to this region. it is important to understand its complex history and dynamics, and the authors are justly regarded highly in their field. They have conducted research few other scholars have attempted, let alone accomplished.